Blondie Meets Boy Wonder
by OwlTheWise
Summary: Artemis is on her very first mission for the league of shadows and guess who she happens to run into. Boy Wonder is up to his usual antics and can't resist finding out more about the shadows up in coming Tigress. What could possibly go wrong when they cross paths? And how will Arty escape the Batman? With her usual flare of course. One Shot!


The night I first met Boy Wonder and his infamous caped mentor I was, ironically, on my first solo mission. And when I say mission I mean assassination, and solo meaning one of the senior Shadow operatives had a tail on me the entire time I was completing my bloody task.

Although he wasn't doing so great since he sucked at the basic process of being invisible. I had noticed him tailing me soon after I had departed from Shadow HQ. Sliding through the shadows of Gotham's downtown district at about 20 paces behind me. Or maybe my father's intense version of training was paying off in some twisted way.

But anyway, so there I was holding my thin black blade against the Suit's jugular when I hear: "He really isn't your type is he Blondie?"

First off, the sheer trill of the voice I heard was unexpected, much like the Christmas elf costume I discovered that the kid was wearing. Way too much green and red there kiddo. I definitely held back a smirk at that merry little image, and his voice was higher than what I had thought the tiny of the bat twosome would sound like, meaning he really was still just a kid. Younger than my 14 years at least.

Second off, I HATE blonde jokes. Wish that they'd all just spontaneously keel over, like the idiots who still use them! My long blonde locks are something I take immense pride in, like my sister's excellent skill in the world of poisons or my Father's vast collection of sport memorabilia. They're something I choose, no matter how much my father wishes I would chop the cumbersome length off, so any comment that demeans their worth pisses me off.

Sensing my "distraction" in my inner rant the Suit under me tried to use his bigger and broader body to his advantage and reel back on me, taking me by surprise and therefore escaping the cold touch of my blade. Using his stupidity against him I exercised maneuver 94a from the training I received from my Father.

I tilted my wrist up and angled my short sai down and towards his right shoulder, letting him slit his _own_ throat. His thick body slumped forward and I stabbed my blade into the paperwork resting in front of his draining carcass, leaving a clear message of what happens to people who betray the League of Shadows.

After doing so I grabbed a shiny new blade, spinning it into position, as my grey eyes locked into the domino mask of the most famous sidekick of Gotham. I could feel the tail I had watching me leave, most likely to report that I had completed my task with no hesitation. Too bad he didn't stick around, it only got really interesting from there.

He was shorter than what I had pictured him too, from the looks of it he would barely reach my shoulders, which made hand to hand combat out of the question. _When facing an opponent much shorter than you, never go in for close range combat,_ my Father always said. _You may be taller than them, but most of the power behind your moves will be worthless seeing as you'll have to modify of em to even hit their shrimpy limbs. Better to just toss a blade into them, pinning the midget down, then go in for the kill._ Granted when he had taught that lesson, it was geared towards decimating a training class of Riser mutant younglings, not taking on a hero in training. But from the looks of it bird boy was getting a blade right through the chest cavity, since he was casually leaning against the doorway of the penthouse office.

"I mean I know he was feeding the Risers information about your precious Shadows, but offing him in his own office… how unoriginal."

My eyebrows arched over my orange mask by a fraction of an inch at the mention of the rival organization to the Shadows. Smart kid, knowing all about the silent but not quiet battle between the two groups of the underground. But how dare he treat this like a glamorized Hollywood moment! There was nothing glamorous about this. Not a single thing. Did he even know who he was mocking?!

"But if the shadows are sending out blondes in stripes, they're not any better, am I right _Tigress?"_

Well shit. The kid did do his research, knowing who I was before most of the city did, but the level of smugness in his voice made me want to shoot the rather small gap between us and strangle him. Speaking of which, he had drawn closer to the middle of the room during his movie review, and coincidently to my location as well, slowly reaching back for one his goodies tuck away in that belt of his.

My wrist fired before my brain and before he could even flinch, his belt was on the ground, _trimmed_ from his waist, his eyes widening from shock.

Still a newbie. Not bothering to hide a smirk now I continued my attack verbally.

"And how unoriginal would it be to pluck the inexperienced birdie in front of me?" I purred.

He barely had time to recover from my first attack as I vaulted over the desk and glided to him, blocking his feeble excuse for a right hook, and fisted the front of his costume and threw him against the wall next to the desk.

Must have been as fresh from the training mats as myself, except he wasn't prepared for what the job of a hero really entails, where how to be a calculating villain was literally scarred into my nature

Again his eyes widened as he realized what he had gotten himself into, that he was in a bit over his experience level, as he spoke, "Very."

This is the moment I sensed a crossroad in my mission. There were many paths that I could take this newbie down.

I could kill him, which would make the leader of the Shadows a very happy man.

I could subdue him and make him prisoner of the Shadows, forcing his mentor to his knees, which my father would be pleased by.

Or I could let him go. Just let him go and live for another day, maybe convincing him to drop his nightly extracurricular activities, which would suit me just fine.

No kid should have to live like this, looking down at his thin frame that I held in my hand, I realized he was young. Young enough to leave and never look back. It was already too late for me. He should have the chance at the childhood I never got.

Just as I was about to release the kid I felt a presence from above. Strengthening my grip, I pulled him close and spun away from the wall, just as the Batman himself dropped down from above.

Not wasting time wondering how he had gotten there, he was his own version of a shadow, I released a sebon from my wrist guard and directed it's point up to under bird boy's chin. He reflexidly tried to pull away from my grasp, but I dug my tiger claws into his skin and applied a tish more pressure to the needle. Let's just say he stopped squirming pretty quick after that.

Looking at the kid's mentor, I could see that this _successful_ mission was rapidly going downhill.

I didn't wait for an introduction from the cape crusader, I focused on finding an escape route with at least a half-ass chance at getting past the Bats and his birdie fledgling.

My eyes were slowly shifting around the room, all while not leaving the tall frame in front of me with practiced confidence. Landing on something bright yellow in the right corner of my vision, I inwardly smirked. _Thank you Boy Wonder for being oh so wonderful._

"Release him," a deep tone growled out, and I could nearly feel the killing intention behind the mask. Jutting out of my inner plan making I looked back to the Batman and came to a conclusion about him. Well all heroes really.

No matter how much this man wanted to kill me, strike me down, for holding a precious person of his hostage, the mask wouldn't let him. Killing wasn't in the little hero handbook handed out at the Justice League Meetings.

False confidence washed all over me. Killing is not included in hero's books. Too bad it's in mine, which made my plan all that much more perfect.

I tightened my grip on the small frame in front of me, and as if sensing my deadly intentions the black cape moved. Moved fast. Good thing I did too. Instead of using the sebon in my right hand to drag across Robin's throat, I reversed and flung it at the yellow belt sitting in the corner, nailing what I hoped was a tube of long night sleepy gas, but that was wishful thinking. As large hands closed in on the two of us I pushed the kid right into his mentor with one of my feet kicking his back.

This move was unexpected from either party as they made a very ungraceful re-acquaintance, while I faded into the shadows of the office letting the vapors shroud my steps back to the wall of windows behind the desk.

Batman recovered first and gracefully, well as much as he could, shoved Robin out of the line of fire. I vaguely remember the kid spinning into a wall, but I was more focused on staying away from the grasp of his mentor.

Speaking of whom, was looking at me with a mix of confusion, like I was a puzzle he couldn't quite figure out.

Well I wasn't one trained to waste such an opportunity of a dazed Batman and a smoky room. My Father had taught me better than that. Applying a technique my Father used I gave a smug smile, added a flourish of fingers, and smashed through one of the offices floor to ceiling windows. As I fell to the world below I saw the flash of a black eared mask, but I turned and released a mini grappling hook from my uniforms sleeves before getting a great look.

My shoulders pulled as the slack went tight, but I neatly vaulted onto a lower building's roof. Mission complete. As I headed back to Shadow HQ my fingers went numb, and my body started tingling. I killed a man. Beat the most famous side-kick of Gotham, and had escaped _the_ Batman.

All on day one.

I thought that strangely, it wasn't the feeling of victory coursing through my veins like my Father always swore to have after a successful venture, but a feeling of dread. Just how many more of these would I have to complete before I finally didn't get away with my life.

ROBIN'S POV

Sighing and staring up at my room's ceiling, I released the modified batarang I had been tweaking since returning from patrol earlier in the morning. The model was almost ready for its debut mission, and the extra curved edges with a bright red color were perfect last minute changes from the original model.

My belt was also getting a remodel, a flexible steel band sandwiched between the cloth to prevent any future strip actions. I couldn't wait to test them against some new baddies.

Too bad Bruce had probably benched me from patrolling, or any sort of hero extracurriculars for the next six months. And hopefully that's all it'd be. Not that I blamed him for it. I had totally deviated from the rules that he'd supplied me with. Viatedly, the opposite of deviate of course, I should have fallen back when he caught wind of a Shadow operation in the area while we were on patrol, and remained as his backup and sidekick.

Slamming my fist against the midnight covers of the bed, that's what a good protégé would have done.

But nooooooo, like the cocky little twit I am, I decided to take on the Shadow operative myself. So before Batman could lock in on their location, I hacked the rumored office's security feed and made my way up to the executive office of Julio Bartez without my mentor, thinking I was completely prepared for whatever came at me.

In less than 7 minutes a blond teenager managed to not only single handedly deflate any sense of ego that I had going into one of my first _solo_ missions, she had done it weaponless.

I had known my skills weren't up to Bruce's levels, but that'd take time which I hadn't wanted to wait for.

Sesh, besides my first two minutes of saucy chit chat, I barely had a chance to do anything except gape at her. Her movements were fluid throughout our entire encounter. Effortless. The moves she used on me were basic ones, but completed with such precision and speed it was like she didn't have to think.

My eyes narrowed on a spec on the ceiling above. It was like she had been born slicing obese business execs throats. Or like she had had some serious training. The kind of training that made Bruce's five hour workout sessions look like yoga classes for the elderly.

So here I found myself back at Wayne mansion, holed up in my spacious room gifted to me by my adoptive father figure, fine tuning my gadgets and getting traught, so that my next encounter with the bad-ass Tigress didn't have such a pitiful outcome.

I brought my arm up to my framed eyes to literally hide from the humiliation. Beaten and benched by a blonde. Just wait til Wally finds out.


End file.
